The Omen (February 27 at 7 & 9:30 p.m. at the CWRU Film Society, Strosacker Auditorium)

With the smash-hit success of THE EXORCIST book-and-movie package, there was a media vogue for devil-worship and occultism in the early 1970s. In that milieu this dark script, derived from some dubious and badly-paraphrased Bible passages, got an amen-hallelujah from Hollywood, to become a big-budget supernatural production, with real money spent on its scares and an A-list cast (both were still relative rarities for the horror genre at that time). 

Though critics didn't much like THE OMEN (Michael Medved listed it in 1980 as one of the 50 worst films ever made) and the basic idea was done with more insidious chills and deeper psychological insight in ROSEMARY’S BABY, this movie was a box-office hit, spawning several sequels, and getting a remake in 2006 that nobody much remembers.

The original 1976 shocker is sturdily-built but predictable and downbeat, with its extravagant death scenes tending to stand out more so than the lugubrious narrative from director Richard Donner, who later did a much better, bang-up job with SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE (and, as far as some fans are concerned, THE GOONIES).

31 Days of Halloween 2013: The Life After Death Project

Review by Charles Cassady, Jr.

Okay, here is where a lesser critic might have inserted one of those tiresome "Based on a True Story"/"Inspired By Actual Events" PG-13 rated Hollywood spook shows that P.T. Barnum their way into the strip-mall multiplexes every September or October. You've probably seen a few of them, but simply forgotten the experience: A HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT, THE EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE, AN AMERICAN HAUNTING, THE AMITYVILLE HORROR, THE POSSESSION (or was it called THE POSSESSED? I actually forget), THE APPARITION, THE RITE, etc. etc. I can't imagine who was actually convinced of the paranormal by any of these, except the sort of mouth-breathers who actually believe that reality-TV is true and unscripted. Especially the Discovery Channel and Travel Channel embarrassments where guys in black T-shirts with I/F cameras lurk around abandoned buildings and pretend to be terrorized by `orbs.' 

31 Days of Halloween 2013: The Exorcist in the 21st Century

Review by Charles Cassady, Jr.

A few years ago there was something in theaters called THE RITE, a blah occult chiller, “inspired by actual events” (yes, yet another based-on-a-true-story horror picture; is there anyone besides children and Obama supporters who are still taken in by that come-on?), with Sir Anthony Hopkins largely wasted in a potboiler about modern exorcists in Italy. Frogs played an important role in it, as I recall, frogs and CGI.

THE RITE did accomplish one thing – it cultivated enough morbid curiosity in me to actually read Matt Baglia’s nonfiction book of the same title, the “true story” that Hollywood thought worthy enough to render as PG-13 demon kitsch. The book was okay, I guess, a sympathetic account of an American Catholic priest, Fr. Gary, interning with actual Vatican-approved Italian exorcists on the techniques of casting out evil spirits. It acknowledged the indefinably thin line between “real” possession and psychiatric disorders, the whole evolution and proper application of the “Roman Ritual” (AKA exorcism), the various backstories offered on Satan/Lucifer and, for me most of all, anyway, the notion that Italy is a really weird place. I don’t think I’ll go there anytime soon. That even goes for Little Italy.

The Possession

Review by Charles Cassady, Jr.

The forgettable PG-13 horror movie du jour THE POSSESSION claims, like THE APPARITION, A HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT, EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE etc. to be “inspired by a true story.” Maybe no viewers except stupid small children (some in their 20s to 40s) are suckered in anymore by that TEXAS CHAINSAW –esque come-on. But I had aspirations to be a journalist, and I’ve actually written about real-life paranormal accounts extensively. So the perversion of “truth” still grates. Yes, “inspired by a true story.” You know, like Saddam’s WMDs were. Or the Obama/Romney economic-recovery plan. When the new JUDGE DREDD reboot in 3D opens, what are chances that one will be “inspired by a true story?”